Keegan rage at City's Spice Boys

Kevin Keegan tore a strip off Steve McManaman and Robbie Fowler on Wednesday night after the pair missed the team bus back from Leicester's Walkers Stadium.

The former Liverpool Spice Boys, re-united by Manchester City manager Keegan this season, were among five players who stayed in the players' bar after their 3-1 victory in the FA Cup third-round replay.

After the bus drove off without them, a visibly angry Keegan was forced to collect his own car from the team hotel five miles away and go back to the stadium to pick up his stray players.

Keegan's car was surrounded by autograph-hunters as soon as it returned and one said: 'Keegan clearly wasn't happy. He had a face like thunder.'

The manager's patience with Fowler was stretched in November when he fined the striker £120,000 after he was pictured drinking and smoking in a Colchester nightclub following the Carling Cup win at Queens Park Rangers.

Keegan made his point after Fowler, McManaman, Joey Barton, Shaun Wright-Phillips and Trevor Sinclair failed to join the rest of their team-mates who had already boarded the bus.

When it drove off, the hotel-bound City players phoned their five colleagues to alert them. A Walkers Stadium official said: 'I couldn't believe it when I saw the team coach pulling away because I knew there were still some players up on the second floor in the players' bar.

'You could understand them perhaps forgetting one - but not four or five. It's safe to assume someone was making a point.'

As well as Keegan, who collected McManaman, Wright-Phillips and Sinclair, club Press officer Paul Tyrell returned to the stadium and took Fowler and Barton to the team hotel. Tyrell said there had been a mix-up because some players have their cars driven to grounds during the match.